Weird: The Al Yankovic Story
Short description
Weird: The Al Yankovic Story is a comic biopic of the musician Alfred Yankovic, known as "Weird Al," who built a career on parodying hit songs. Raised by a father who wanted him to take a factory job, he took up the accordion and later sent a parody of a chart success to a radio station, which made his name. The film follows his rise, his celebrity romances and the excesses that came with fame, with Madonna among the people he becomes involved with. It is a deliberately exaggerated account rather than a straightforward record of his life.
Eric Appel directed and wrote the screenplay with Yankovic, who also produced. Daniel Radcliffe plays Yankovic, with Evan Rachel Wood as Madonna, Rainn Wilson as the radio host Dr. Demento, Toby Huss as his father Nick, and Jack Lancaster and Spencer Treat Clark in supporting roles. The film was Appel's first feature as director; he went on to make Die Hart and its sequel, and later The Breadwinner.
Made for about 12 million dollars, the film runs 108 minutes. It drew a critics' rating of 7.2/10 from 162 reviews, while audiences gave it 6.8/10 on IMDb from around 48,000 votes and 6.7/10 on TMDB from roughly 682 votes, a narrower gap between the two than the review count suggests.
What's left behind the scenes
- Daniel Radcliffe genuinely learned to play the accordion. Initially, he took lessons from a friend, then from Yankovic himself on the set.
- If Daniel Radcliffe had turned down the role, it would have been offered to Adam Driver.
- The “Weird Al” Yankovic Effect” is a real phenomenon. Following the release of Yankovic’s parodies, many artists have noted an increase in sales of their musical works. Nirvana believes it owes several additional million copies sold of the album “Nevermind” (1991) to him, and rapper Chamillionaire claims he owes Yankovic partial credit for his Grammy award.
- Initially, it was planned for Freddie Mercury to be present at the pool party, but the band Queen decided otherwise. It was decided to use John Deacon for filming this scene, which turned out even better, as he was the one who wrote the song “Another One Bites the Dust” from the album “The Game” (1980).
- In a sense, “Weird Al” Yankovic chose Daniel Radcliffe for the lead role in the film because he heard his performance on “The Graham Norton Show” in 2007, when he performed “The Elements” (1959) by Tom Lehrer.
- Much of what is shown in the film actually happened. Yankovic acquired his first accordion from a traveling salesman. He did indeed record the single “My Bologna” in a bathroom, although this occurred before he met the other members of his future band. This parody did become popular instantly. During the performance of the parody “Another One Rides the Bus,” John Schwartz did use an accordion case as a drum, though, again, this happened before Yankovic and Schwartz met the rest of the band. From 1983 to 1996, Yankovic did record for The Scotti Brothers Records label. Madonna herself offered Yankovic to parody her 1984 hit “Like a Virgin” at the time. It is also true that radio host Barry Hansen did not have children of his own.
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